For many years, poultry has been processed on assembly lines in a mass-production style. Defeathered poultry carcasses are suspended in shackles attached to a continuous overhead conveyor. The carcasses are moved by the conveyor through work stations to process the carcass and to prepare it for packaging and shipping to consumers. The work stations perform a different operation on the carcass. These operations include removing the vent of the carcass, opening the abdomen, and pulling the viscera from the carcass.
For many years, these operations were performed manually. However, apparatus have been developed to mechanize many of the operations for processing poultry carcasses. In the early 1970's, an eviscerator was developed in Europe for removing viscera from chickens. Other apparatus for eviscerating chickens have since been developed.
The various known eviscerators for chickens are substantially similar in their operation. The eviscerator typically is pear-shaped, and is positioned upright. A plurality of holders are spaced around the perimeter of the eviscerator for holding a carcass for evisceration. A motor rotates the eviscerator. The continuous overhead conveyor carrying the carcasses routes around the top of the eviscerator by means of guides and idler wheels. The carcasses suspended from shackles are thereby carried past the eviscerator in alignment with one of the holders. The holders each entrap one of the carcasses on the conveyor to position the carcass for removal of the viscera. A plunger, commonly referred to in the industry as a spoon, enters the cavity of the carcass vertically from above. As the eviscerator rotates, a cam guides the travel of the spoons. One of the spoons enters the cavity, engages the viscera, and withdraws. The spoon pulls the viscera from the cavity.
The evisceration process is performed continuously as the conveyor carries the carcasses past the eviscerator. Typically the eviscerators have a diameter of five or six feet. Some large, high capacity eviscerators can eviscerate up to 100 carcasses per minute.
While these evisceration apparatus are satisfactory for processing chickens, the mechanized eviscerator has not successfully been used for turkeys in the United States. The anatomy of the chicken and the turkey differs. Chickens normally weigh between three and five pounds, whereas, the turkey carcass weighs from 12 to 25 pounds. Chickens are carried on the shackle of the conveyor on a two-point suspension. The birds are hung by the hocks. The chicken accordingly hangs vertically for eviscerating. The turkeys, however, are typically placed on three-point suspension so that the turkey carcass hangs substantially horizontally. The three-point suspension supports the turkey carcass by the hocks and the head. The larger turkey carcass does not hang properly on a two-point suspension for eviscerating and for other operations to be performed. Because of the three-point suspension requirement for turkey carcass, more of the processing operations for turkey carcasses must be performed manually. In particular, evisceration is a manual process whereby a worker manually inserts a spoon into the carcass, engages the viscera, and retracts the spoon pulling the viscera from the carcass.
Accordingly, there is a need in the art for an improved method and apparatus of eviscerating turkey carcasses.